The release of this pair of CDs is timely. As I write, The BBC
Promenade Concerts are about to begin and when they finish Jiří
Bělohlávek will step down as Chief Conductor of
the BBC Symphony Orchestra, a post he has held since 2006. He
is to return home for a second spell as Chief Conductor of the
Czech Philharmonic Orchestra and he will be succeeded as the
BBCSO’s Chief Conductor by Sakari Oramo in 2013. Happily,
I believe that he will continue to work with the BBC Symphony
Orchestra.
These CDs preserve a concert that Bělohlávek and
the orchestra gave as part of the 63rd Prague Spring
International Music Festival in 2008. Although the Britten piece
occupies the second disc I strongly suspect that the Suk symphony
was played in the second half of the concert. That would seem
the more logical ordering to me and it may well be confirmed
by the applause - over a minute’s worth in each case -
that follows each piece; it’s warm but respectful after
the Britten but vociferous after the Suk. Incidentally, the
audience is otherwise commendably quiet, so far as I could tell.
The pairing of these two works is not, I admit, one that would
have occurred to me but in fact they work very well together
as a programme.
The Britten receives a fine performance. The doom-laden opening,
with its pounding drums, augurs well and you can tell that Bělohlávek
has established a firm grip on the music from the outset. In
a broadly-paced reading of the first movement, ‘Lacrymosa’,
he and his orchestra invest the music with menace and power
- the BBCSO brass are especially menacing. The darting, spitting,
flickering writing of ‘Dies Irae’ is brought off
very well; the playing combines malevolence and virtuosity.
Finally, ‘Requiem aeternam’ brings some solace.
Bělohlávek’s fine reading of this movement
is capped by an ardent climax (from 3:34), tailing off into
the calm acceptance of the closing pages. This performance is
a considerable success.
Though the performance of Sinfonia da Requiem is a fine
one, Bělohlávek’s account of Asrael
is finer still. He has recorded it before; there’s a 1991
recording on Chandos, made under studio conditions, I think,
with the Czech Philharmonic (review). I’ve not heard that version. Among the recordings that
I have heard, I would give pride of place to the superb account
by the Czech Philharmonic and Sir Charles Mackerras (review), taken from concerts in Prague, and the equally fine
Bavarian Radio studio-made performance by Kubelik (Panton 81
1101-2) if you can still find it. The 1990 Virgin Classics recording
by Libor Pešek and the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra
should not be underestimated either; this recording was my way
into the piece many years ago. And then, of course, there’s
the classic studio version by the great Vaclav Talich, which
all who love this symphony will want in their collections (review), but the mono recording is now sixty years old. However,
this new Asrael should make strong claims on the attentions
of collectors.
It’s a symphony steeped in deeply felt bereavement; little
wonder that Suk entitled the workAsrael after the Angel
who, in Muslim mythology, guides the souls of the dead. It was
planned originally as a five-movement tribute to his father-in-law,
Dvořák, whose death in 1904 affected him deeply.
The first three movements had been written and a start made
on the slow movement when Suk was afflicted by an even greater
blow. In July 1905 his wife, Otilie (Otlyka), Dvořák’s
daughter, died suddenly. She was just 27 years old and she and
Suk had been married only since 1898. Once he was able to face
resuming the composition of his symphony Suk penned a new slow
movement in memory of his wife and also abandoned his idea of
a set of variations in tribute to Dvořák as the
finale and composed a last movement cast in a very different
hue. The resulting symphony, completed in 1906, is a magnificent
and substantial creation, almost Mahlerian in its reach and
depth of feeling.
It is only comparatively recently that the work has been heard
with any frequency in the UK. Two conductors led the way: Libor
Pešek played and recorded it during his time in Liverpool
and Simon Rattle gave it during his time with the CBSO - I recall
attending a fine performance by him in Cheltenham: I wonder
if he will ever return to the score; I wish he would. Even so,
concert performances in the UK remain few and far between and
it would not surprise me if that were not also the case in countries
other than the former Czechoslovakia. Happily, the work has
been much better represented on CD in the last couple of decades.
Bělohlávek leads a very intense performance. From
the outset the BBCSO projects the music strongly and eloquently.
The music of the first movement is steeped in deep feeling and
loss and this comes out very much in the performance. The powerful
climaxes, such as the one beginning at 10:20 are delivered magnificently
and the recording engineers report them in excellent sound that
has real presence. However, there’s a great deal of delicate
writing as well for the strings and woodwind and this is put
across just as impressively. The dreadful final climax (from
13:29) is tremendously potent, the bass drum pounding away beneath
the rest of the mighty orchestral sound.
The second movement is at times a spectral funeral march and
it’s surely no accident that there are echoes of Dvořák’s
Requiem. The third movement is a substantial scherzo. As it
says of this movement in the English translation of the notes
accompanying Talich’s recording “The feverish dream
is full of shades, spectres and cunningness”. That’s
rather well put. Bělohlávek gets his orchestra to
play this music vividly and with a real sense of fantasy. The
slower central section is expansively done and when the scherzo
material returns the turbulent closing pages sound especially
effective.
The second part of the symphony moves from mourning Dvořák
to eulogizing Suk’s beloved young wife. The Adagio is
entitled ‘To Otylka’ and it’s a moving but
not overwrought elegy. Here Bělohlávek’s interpretation
is noble and eloquent, displaying great empathy for Suk’s
music. The response of the BBC orchestra is very fine indeed.
The finale, another Adagio, opens dramatically with rhetorical
timpani strokes. What follows is a complex and often passionate
movement but eventually (at 9:27), some fifty-five minutes after
the symphony began, the music at last achieves major key warmth
and some consolation. It’s a gently moving conclusion
to this very powerful symphony. Suk wrote to a friend “Do
you know what I had to go through before I got to that final
C major? No, it’s not a work of pain - but a work of superhuman
energy.”
As I indicated near the start of this review, the performance
of Asrael is applauded vociferously by the audience.
I’m not surprised for the reading is a gripping one, full
of concentration and tension. Moreover, the BBCSO’s playing
is splendid. This is a performance that, like the recordings
by Kubelik, Mackerras, Pešek and Talich shows the work’s
immense stature. Both the performances on this set are a fine
souvenir of the fruitful partnership between Jiří
Bělohlávek and the BBC Symphony Orchestra. The Supraphon
sound is very good indeed. Rob Cowan’s notes are a bit
disappointing. Understandably, given the timing of this release,
he devotes quite a bit of space to discussing Bělohlávek’s
work at the BBC but I’d have liked a bit more comment
on the two pieces of music, especially since Mr. Cowan is a
well-known and knowledgeable enthusiast for Czech music.
Bělohlávek and the orchestra played the Suk in London
a few days before the concert preserved here and that performance
was reviewed for MusicWeb International Seen and Heard by Evan Dickerson.
John Quinn
Discography and review listing: Sinfonia
da requiem
BBC Symphony Orchestra/Jiří Bělohlávek
